Have you noticed that a great many people are missing something? Have you noticed how they are able to justify nearly any behavior or action? I remember my mother and father telling me as a child that I should be “ashamed” of myself when I did something wrong. My reaction was to bow my head and begin thinking about what I’d done. As I grew older, I needed the prompting of my parents less and less to evoke shame. I knew when I was wrong and shame often initiated change in my behavior. The wrong stuff that I justified, I maintained. It was likely to be done again by me. The more I did whatever it was, the more I justified and the easier it got.

A little thing like shame struck a desire within me to change. As I look around at people I see them justifying all kinds of bad behavior. Seldom do I hear an admittance of anything wrong. This includes the shame of dressing inappropriately, being super overtly sexual in public, or making someone’s life miserable through social media. Obviously there is no shame experienced because the next day people awaken to a brand new day to do the same mess all over again. Over the weekend I took a drive down the historic Magnificent Mile (Michigan Ave.) close to downtown Chicago. My eyes were assaulted by a number of people who decided to wear the least amount of fabric to cover their bodies; just enough to keep them from a jail cell. Possessing no shame at all, they walked proudly. They ranged in age from 70 something to teens. I considered that some of these fashion misfits may have lost a bet and were dared to make spectacles of themselves. There’s no way all of them chose to ventilate their pores and shock people around them. No way; it had to be a wager that was lost. Yeah, that’s it!

And what about the people who either tell all their business on Facebook and Twitter, or they tell yours? Where is their shame? It’s not there. Forget it. You want to enlighten them by letting them know it’s not really a good idea to film themselves doing private things and then post it to the world. Even worse is posting things that should never be done period and showing the world. This includes physical beat-downs, rapes, and murder. Really? Why would anyone do that? Don’t they have any shame? Obviously not. So we ask ourselves the not-so proverbial question, what happened? Indeed, what has happened? Without shame, it will happen again tomorrow. We have to change that. We can, but we have to start with ourselves.

Even though we live in a 24-hour news cycle where cable networks broadcast programming (not just news) continuously, we exist in a news-drought. True news is actually where something happens and it gets reported without added opinion, without editorial comments by the journalist and definitely without altering any facts. Based on that criteria, we live in a pure news drought-stricken land. If news was food, we’d be a seriously malnourished country. The level of professionalism has reached an unprecedented sub-basement low.If you like the eye-rollers who perform that immature reaction to guests they invited but immediately attempt to eradicate them, you can tune to that cable network. If you like a newscaster that showed her impartiality by crying on air the day after the election, you can tune in to that network. If you enjoy having journalists that ignore important stories that don’t fit their political narrative, you’ll have no problem tuning in to that because they own two networks, one on cable and the other on regular nightly news. They really want to control what we, the public, thinks and knows. They take an awful chance though because doing this is dangerous. More than a couple of times there’ve been major news stories they chose to ignore that still managed to grow big and by the time they reported it they had to first bring their viewers up to speed on a days-old item. That’s what many communist countries do. Venezuela was known for keeping their people in the dark about world affairs. One of their news stations went against the dictator and aired unscripted material. They blockaded themselves only to be later arrested. Who knows what happened to some of them.

We don’t live there. Our biggest selling feature for the US is freedom. Freedom of thought, speech, ideas, viewpoints, religion, employment, education, etc. The day after the election, CNN promptly announced it would NOT carry the first White House briefing live, even though this is a tradition. Why? Listen, CNN, Fox, MSNBC, NBC, ABC, and CBS, just give us the news and let us decipher it. Stop spoon feeding us according to our political bent. Stop withholding news. Stop making your personality larger than the news stories. I shouldn’t have to scroll down to a non-American network to get raw data on the happenings of my own nation. Stop taking us for granted with your immaturity, lack of professionalism and opinionated “news”. We want truth, whether we can handle it or not. Let us decide. Just report and get out of the way. Make it news for a thinking public that is ready to feast. We are hungry for truth. If you can’t do that, it may be time to repackage yourself as a commentary site and not a news channel.

March is Women’s History Month. That makes this blog very timely and appropriate. When I was born, my parents were congratulated by Dr. Mohre for having their third girl. I was born female but it took time to become a woman. Any schoolboy and girl has learned in their first few biology classes the scientific, biological and logical definition of a male and female human being. They learn the emphatic truth that a female is chromosomally an XX and a male is XY.

Womanhood is a state of maturity and a delicate balance of very important issues that occurred in my life over time causing me to grow from being a girl into becoming a full woman. Nature made me a female but time and maturity made me a woman. It’s an issue of emotional growth. It is an amazing developmental process of understanding, nurturing, attitude, and spirituality. As a woman, I have learned my value and it is immense. I would never run from my femininity and womanhood; they are my strengths. Ignoring being a woman would be illogical and in direct opposition to a God-given tool that I have opted to use for my intended benefit. Women make huge mistakes when they forsake their womanhood in their attempt to gain success. What are they imitating; a man? At best, a woman can only poorly imitate a man and a man a woman. Nature has made each strong in their own way. To ignore those strengths or trying to blur the lines is fundamentally ineffective.

The war on womanhood didn’t just start this decade. It even started before some women thought igniting perfectly good undergarments somehow set them free. There was a studied attempt to change the very framework of the strengths and perks of being a woman. There are many times when being a woman helps me as our American culture sets the tone for how we are treated in society. When I trained several Chicago police officers and went on “ride-alongs”, we frequently stopped gang members to check them for illegal items. At least 90% of the time, my presence as a woman caused the gang members to behave in a more civil manner. In other words, theses men had respect for me that they didn’t have for other males. That’s a strength and I like it. Why would I try to eliminate that or muddy it?

It’s not just some men that have waged war on womanhood, but women. Recently a man walking through a door held it open for a woman coming behind him. She rightly thanked him but another woman seeing it began to berate the man and asked him why he did that. Are we so hungry for equality that even opening doors empowers us? Really? I hope that man isn't marred and uninterested in ever opening a door for another woman. That woman who berated him has the wrong attitude on femininity. She is not alone. Our society is getting it wrong daily. Many women were shocked and insulted when Bruce Jenner was named "woman of the year" by a very confused staff at Glamour magazine. That was a great example of the war on womanhood.

We have fought the wrong battles and have ignored the very things that won wars. True femininity is to be enjoyed, embraced and utilized for the strength it is. Waging a war on womanhood is counterproductive and has no merit. Instead of thinking that being a real woman is debasing and un-empowering, we must celebrate and recognize our strengths as natural women. They are, after all, God-given.

If you ever watched the original Star Trek series you know who Spock was. His character was a Vulcan who based all he did on logic. He was hard wired for it. Spock rejected anything illogical even though he was inundated by humans who offered no apologies for their lack of it.

Enter 2017 where logic and truth often seem to be far removed from our daily lives. People now think they can not only create their own truths but force you to personally adopt it. They believe they can remake the truth by merely renaming something as if it automatically changes because we call it by a different name. You can look at a pear and call it a grape but in truth, it remains a pear. Shakespeare said “a rose by any other name would smell as sweet”. In other words, what something is called doesn’t change what it is. An item or entity is defined by its nature and not by its name. Most English words have a Latin or Greek derivation. These root words have defined meaning based on the truth of composition. Science is the same. It would be illogical to look at a heart and call it a liver. The same is true for looking at silver and calling it tin. That wouldn’t make sense and it’d be a lie.

The truth is an amazing constant. It’s bold and solid. It never seeks consultation or opinion. There are practical truths that can’t be altered. If you say you were born in Philadelphia you either were or you weren’t. That is an immovable truth. There are commercials for websites that offer to use your DNA to find out exactly your ancestry. They can even give you percentages. Your DNA can’t lie or be altered. It has nothing to do with how you look but about what your blood reveals.

Acceptance of truth is hard for most of us. We live in a world that makes just about everything gray so that there are no absolutes. Truth operates outside of that notion. Someone said facts are stubborn things. A generation or society that finds comfort in lies and supports them is childlike and doesn’t deal in reality. Just like most of our reality shows are actually not. Some parents tell a lie about a pet’s death in order to escape tears. They tell their children there’s a Santa, a tooth fairy, and an Easter bunny. I recently met a man who was having an issue with his son who found out there was no such person as Santa Claus. The boy was totally devastated and began questioning many things his father told him. This worried the man who felt his son’s faith in him was shaken.

I met a nice lady who wondered why her doctor didn’t explain to her the gravity of prediabetes. She asked why her doctor didn’t tell her the truth. She also lamented about her husband and said why didn’t anyone tell her how tough marriage was instead of focusing on the wedding, honeymoon and romance. They ignored the natural struggles of binding two lives. She also wondered why no one told her how tough it was to be a parent. This woman had real disappointments because she felt she was denied the truth.

We owe it to our millennials to not let them live outside the real world and to prepare them well for difficulties and reality. If they’re prepared they will be better suited to handle the craziness of life. They wouldn’t fall apart due to a lack of proper expectation. They won’t walk away from jobs, relationships and life because they weren’t prepared to deal with truth. We can help a generation become stronger and not weaker. We can help them learn the value of truth, take on life and win. It all starts by telling them they are looking at a pear and not a grape!

Without question, we are inundated daily by voices from every province, every ideology, every agenda and every perspective. We are barraged by information, both true and false. There are people who care about truth and those who don’t. Too often there are those who depend on their name, reputation or position to garner a positive reaction to whatever they’re trying to “sell”. Just as an example, this is frequently done during job interviews. People hope that looking good, smelling good, being well-mannered and having a nicely presented resume printed on quality stationery is all there is. Remember this: the message matters. As people dig deeper, the actual message becomes clearer.

We can’t afford to be distracted by the packaging of anything. Don’t let how something looks be the only thing that persuades you. People who don’t have much to their message will hope that you’ll be focused on the appearance and not on the contents. You have coworkers like that. They make it look good as though they’re hard working, accurate, professional and efficient. What they’re often missing is the effectual fervent message of true character, drive, continued execution of duties, performance and accomplishment.

There is something even more significant here. A man who owned a store that his son began working in offered the young man an important piece of advice that was useful for a life time. After he showed his son the entire inventory he said to him no matter what you put in the front window, be certain you have something of greater value in the back. In other words, whatever you put out front, make certain you have more in reserve. Don’t be all show. Your message matters. Your message is the true essence of what you are. Your exterior, while important, isn’t enough to carry you. Once people start to dig they should find the heavy-duty artillery. No fluff allowed. If you lack wisdom, remain quiet until you develop some. Observe and learn. Keep your eyes and ears open and drink in the knowledge and experiences of others who have wisdom. The only thing we should learn from a fool is what not to do. Clearly, that is a valuable lesson.

A person pursuing a love interest may say all kinds of things. They may be filled with compliments and sweet observations; after all, they are trying to win a heart. You can’t afford to get caught up in that and fail to find out the intention of their heart. If they claim love, find out what love means to them. Ask their views of marriage and divorce. Ask their views on being monogamous. If they don’t have much to say except flattering words, you may want to keep it moving. The message they are sending matters.

The recent election showed us a media that focused far more on the candidates personalities than on their messages. At least four out of every five stories dealt with personality issues. The message was often lost. That’s why so many voters often don’t have good info about the candidate’s policies or positions. By focusing on the wrong things some media frequently insults its readers and viewers. They overwhelmingly concerned themselves with how something was said rather than what was said. Even the media analysis from the debates concentrated on who was more likable, who had the best one-liners, and who insulted whom the most. I refused to be distracted by this nonsense and instead chose to focus on the message. That wasn’t easy because little was done by the media to give us that info. Wanting a true message to evaluate kept me at odds with the nightly news as well as the daytime news shows that happen to be more show than news. I don’t hire a president based on likability, personality, sense of humor, spouses, toothy smiles or charity-giving. The message tells you what they intend to do and whether or not they have the stamina to lead us out of difficult times. We all owe it to our communities, families and nation to make certain we get the true message, even if it means we have to explore on our own, not depending on the media.

Be certain your personal message is the one you want to convey to the world. Superficiality it is a crutch. People stay on the surface when they don’t want to be controversial, state an opinion, say that something is wrong, be emphatic or declare absolute truth. Their message is flimsy and has no depth. They are people pleasers that are filled with fear. Fear immobilizes and impairs. It brings confusion and echoes a lack of dignity. The greatest fear most of us experience is that of truth. Lies can be rejected but truth remains whether we accept it or not. Truth is not predicated on whether or not we believe it. Truth doesn’t consult with us nor does it change according to what we prefer. It is a constant. We have to adjust to it rather than the reverse. Your message is a reflection of your truths. It’s on display for the world to see. It is the sum of who you are and where you’re headed. Change your message and you change the entire narrative of your destination. As usual, as always, the message matters. It always will matter, even in a world focused on packaging.